Welfare System Pros And Cons

I was born in Dallas, Texas and grew up in a nearby town named Irving. While living in this economically disadvantaged community, I witnessed and experienced the adversities posed by living in poverty. Where some see disaster, I see opportunity; where others see laziness and fault, I see misfortune and fortitude; what some call a welfare city, I call home.
In the 2015-2016 school year, approximately eighty-seven percent of the students in my school were classified as "economically disadvantaged" according to the Irving Independent School District; additionally, over fifty percent of students in my school qualify for free or reduced lunch. A majority of my peers and I come from homes lead by single parents and working teenagers, a fact that
Many believe that poor and lazy are synonymous terms: they call us leeches who drain the country of its economic prosperity by living off of welfare, as if doing so was glamorous or easy. Others believe our parents do not appreciate education and lead us to be drug abusers and alcoholics; they believe we will never amount to anything and that our future generations will follow in the same worthless footsteps we are expected to take. They are wrong. Welfare is not some luxurious or ideal payout that the poor live for. Not only does welfare provide limited assistance, it is also embarrassing to use. Many of us live in deteriorating houses or apartments and use cheap, outdated clothes, factors that cause social anxiety, especially for teenagers trying to fit in. My mother, along with hundreds of other parents, work long hours at difficult, dead end jobs just to live paycheck to paycheck. Furthermore, many of these parents are victims of some misfortune that has led them to their current financial state. In spite of the stereotypes, the majority of the parents I know greatly value the education of their children because of their present situation. Like any parent, they want their children to grant themselves the lives